I'm Yours Rhythm Guitar Lesson

Learn how to strum pop/reggae patterns on one acoustic guitar!

The rhythm guitar is tricky, you will have to start with an upstroke, the second 16th of beat 4 is where the riff starts.

Count to your self and strum along in the air:

1 (234) 2 (234) 3 (234) 4 (234)

This should get you on the right track, the key is to get your right hand to work as a pendulum of 16th notes.

As the blog discuss, the rhythm guitar of 'I'm Yours' is a combination of the two parts played on the original demo.

Rhythm Guitar video lesson

When you get it right you are playing all the accents of the beat that a band would:

1. Beat 1, usually not accentuated in Reggae, but in Pop/Reggae it is, so make beat 1 stand out, every bar.
2. Back beat, the back beat is played using beat 2 and 4's 3rd 16th.
3. Back beat on beat 1 and 3 is simple, only one 16th needed.
4. Riff, the riff happens on 16th 2 and 3 over beat 4, the rest of the strumming pattern remains the same.

Put the four points above together and you have the basic guitar part for 'I'm Yours'.

To make the part sound really good you need to dampen the strings.

This can be done with both your left and right hand, watch the video for details.

Possibly the easiest way to learn this song is to first learn the Etude included in the 'Rhythm Guitar' e Book.

Rhythm Guitar e Book